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Deviance's Tips to help keep your Windows PC fast and secure.


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#16 LinktheMaster

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Posted 05 June 2009 - 09:28 PM

I personally recommend against AVG. It's really not that great. As far as what it picks up, it's roughly on part with Norton and the others. The only advantage is that it's free.

Avast is bad about picking up false positives. icon_unsettled.gif I personally use NOD32 (it's not free), and it seems to be really good to me.

Some more advice from me...

1. If you're computers runs slowly, go to Start->Run (or win+r) and type in msconfig, then go over to the Startup Tab. Go through the list here and start deselecting things you don't need. Frequent items that slow down computers are adobe reader, quicktime, real player, and things like that. Most of these programs aren't needed on startup. Sure, they'll make it faster when you start up adobe reader, but they slow everything else down. However, don't deselect things if you don't know what you're doing! If you don't know what something is in startup, google it and do research!

2. If your browser is running slowly (or sometimes having problems with websites), try removing useless toolbars like Google and Yahoo toolbars. These are useless things which slow down your browser. Some things (like Blackboard) have problems if your browser has these toolbars as well, and since most browsers have their own search bar, these toolbars are pretty useless anyway. Also, if you have mywebsearch toolbar, remove it! It's spyware!

3. For slower computers, what you can try doing is having an antivirus program like AVG, but disabled the automated scan. Sure, Windows will probably complain, but as long as you run manual scans every so often and are smart, you'll probably be safe. I wouldn't recommend this to the average person, so make sure you're secure first!

#17 Eurysilas

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Posted 06 June 2009 - 06:37 AM

QUOTE(Saffith)
It should have an option to decide based on domain... Looks like it here, at least: http://whatismyipadd...ript/konqueror/


Yeah, it does. Sadly, I never got it to work with either Slashdot or GMail. And it doesn't have the option to just block specific script within a domain. But, hey, I'm using the version that comes with Kubuntu Hardy, so.....

#18 Snarwin

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Posted 06 June 2009 - 10:12 AM

QUOTE(LinktheMaster @ Jun 5 2009, 10:28 PM) View Post
Frequent items that slow down computers are adobe reader
Adobe Reader sucks. Don't use it. Use one of these instead.

#19 LinktheMaster

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Posted 06 June 2009 - 06:33 PM

Well, you always want to keep adobe reader, but I agree... for most stuff, adobe reader is too bloated (and unstable) to use. Still, most alternatives don't support typing in PDF forms very well, and, as far as I know, none support it as well as adobe reader, unfortunately.

#20 Beefster

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Posted 06 June 2009 - 09:51 PM

Honestly, Javascript isn't that dangerous. It's really only a threat to IE, plus Adblock takes care of malicious scripts. If you turn JS off, you're missing out on a ton of useful features. My older brother works with it all the time and most of the websites he works on don't even work without Javascript. (or at least CSS, which doesn't work on IE)

#21 Ben

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Posted 07 June 2009 - 08:18 AM

QUOTE(Beefster @ Jun 6 2009, 10:51 PM) View Post

Honestly, Javascript isn't that dangerous. It's really only a threat to IE, plus Adblock takes care of malicious scripts. If you turn JS off, you're missing out on a ton of useful features. My older brother works with it all the time and most of the websites he works on don't even work without Javascript. (or at least CSS, which doesn't work on IE)


If CSS didn't work in IE, PureZC would be black-on-white text without any special layouts other than tables, links would be blue, and visited links would be purple. It would look like a webpage from 1996.

#22 Snarwin

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Posted 07 June 2009 - 10:37 AM

QUOTE(LinktheMaster @ Jun 6 2009, 07:33 PM) View Post

Well, you always want to keep adobe reader, but I agree... for most stuff, adobe reader is too bloated (and unstable) to use. Still, most alternatives don't support typing in PDF forms very well, and, as far as I know, none support it as well as adobe reader, unfortunately.
  1. Uh...have you actually tried them, or are you going by hearsay? At any rate, I never had any trouble at all typing in PDF forms with Foxit Reader, so if there are features it doesn't support, I've never run across them.
  2. Speaking of which: how often, honestly, do you think the average person runs across a PDF form they need to fill in, anyway? I can only speak for myself, of course, but I hardly expect that advanced PDF form support is a huge consideration for most of the people reading this.


QUOTE(Beefster @ Jun 6 2009, 10:51 PM) View Post

Adblock takes care of malicious scripts.
Since when? I always thought that it, you know...blocked ads.

#23 LinktheMaster

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Posted 07 June 2009 - 11:09 AM

QUOTE(Snarwin @ Jun 7 2009, 10:37 AM) View Post
  1. Uh...have you actually tried them, or are you going by hearsay? At any rate, I never had any trouble at all typing in PDF forms with Foxit Reader, so if there are features it doesn't support, I've never run across them.
  2. Speaking of which: how often, honestly, do you think the average person runs across a PDF form they need to fill in, anyway? I can only speak for myself, of course, but I hardly expect that advanced PDF form support is a huge consideration for most of the people reading this.

For the first part, a little bit of both, but I have to admit that I haven't used any alternatives recently. I remember a tried Foxit when it first came out, and it only supported forms partially. But, I've heard that a lot of alternatives still don't support forms that well outside of the basic stuff, but I haven't gone around to test that.

As far as the average person running across them, my college campus uses them all of the time. icon_shrug.gif A lot of forms they ask for (like scholarship forms and the like) have to be filled out on the computer and printed. All of my study abroad forms had to be typed.

#24 Koopa

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Posted 16 July 2009 - 04:31 AM

Deviance, that's a great thread you started. Just one addition I think important:

Use a restricted account. All modern OS offer at least two types of account: Administrator and user. All surfing, mailing, chatting, downloading etc. should only be done with user accounts. Admin accounts are for system maintenance and installing new software (and games that won't run otherwise). It's not completely foolproof but it's a big step forward.

For PDF, I use Foxit Reader. It has its quirks but it's a hell of a lot faster and smaller than Acrobat. For a recent lecture, the professor gave us a PDF of about 50 powerpoint slides stuffed full of images (>50MB size). Acrobat froze after a minute of trying to open it on my laptop every time. Foxit didn't. Linux users of course have programs like evince.

All windows power users should try Process Explorer and Autoruns from sysinternals. The first shows what's currently running and the second what automatically starts on your computer. About 99% of autorun programs are unnecessary and just slow your computer down in my opinion. They are the ones to look at if you have to wait for hours between logging on and being able to actually do something on your computer. A word of warning though: Only use these programs if you know what you're doing. You can seriously muck up things otherwise.

Edited by Koopa, 16 July 2009 - 04:38 AM.


#25 Nicholas Steel

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Posted 16 July 2009 - 09:45 AM

QUOTE
Since when? I always thought that it, you know...blocked ads.
most malicious scripts hide in advertisements?

#26 Snarwin

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Posted 19 July 2009 - 09:28 AM

QUOTE(franpa @ Jul 16 2009, 10:45 AM) View Post

most malicious scripts hide in advertisements?
I'd like to see a source on that, if you don't mind.

#27 Deviance

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Posted 19 July 2009 - 01:59 PM

Ok my first post has been updated. Also Please stay on topic. This is not debate thread....

#28 Nathaniel

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Posted 03 January 2010 - 01:05 PM

I recently started using Avast, and I had an overall bad experience with it. I will be looking at the other recommendations for an antivirus program. I would prefer to use an antivirus program that doesn't automatically start up. While I did shut it off through msconfig, after you reboot, avast is programmed to put itself back on upon startup. So it effectively forces you to load it on startup. It doesn't give you a choice. The only way to not have it start up immediately is to not have it installed. Normally I wouldn't care, but it was really slowing down my machine, and even caused it to crash while playing a game that I barely meet the recommended system requirements on. After uninstalling Avast, my machine boots up much faster, even though it is at risk until I use another antivirus program. I would rather use something that would only run when I want it to, but you get what you pay for if it is free, I guess. If the other free ones have the same issue, then I might go as far as using LTM's non-free recommendation. I want something the gets the job done, but doesn't take over my machine either.

#29 Deviance

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Posted 03 January 2010 - 05:59 PM

Avira Free-AV should do the trick for you. I know you can disable that.


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